


Love at Not-First Sight

by DesertVixen



Category: Blue Castle - L. M. Montgomery
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-24
Updated: 2015-12-24
Packaged: 2018-05-08 19:43:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,538
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5510615
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DesertVixen/pseuds/DesertVixen
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Barney Snaith falls in love with his wife.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Love at Not-First Sight

**Author's Note:**

  * For [kyrieanne](https://archiveofourown.org/users/kyrieanne/gifts).



He couldn’t help but admire Valancy Stirling. 

Barney Snaith knew that she had flown in the face of her stuffy family by taking the job keeping house for Roaring Abel Gay. He had no idea what had caused her to suddenly find the spark of courage that led her to defy her family and convention, but he admired her for it. 

(It was only much later, when she knew that he was John Foster, when she knew everything, that she told him how his words about “fear is the original sin” gave her the courage to stay the course with Abel and Cissy in the face of Dr. Stalling’s visit. How those words had given her the courage to not surrender to what seemed to be her fate, but to speak the truth. He thought it was the highest praise his work had ever recieved.)

Valancy had been the only so-called respectable woman who would do more for poor ill Cissy Gay than make mean-spirited remarks under the guise of concern for the girl’s soul. True, she had taken a wage for doing so – it wasn’t as if Valancy was entirely a saint – but she had done what no one else would do. She had given Cissy the only gift that truly mattered, the opportunity to live her last days in comfort and to die with a friend by her side. 

She had taken such care preparing poor Cissy for her eternal sleep, and he had been honored to help by giving Cissy a blanket of white roses to take with her. It had been the least he could do.

*** ***

He couldn’t help but like Valancy Stirling.

The way that she took pleasure in the simple things made him smile at odd moments. She appreciated a simple movie and dinner more than many women he had known in his past life would have enjoyed an opera and the finest champagne. 

The way she had sat with him and enjoyed the silence when they had been stranded with no gas after he’d rescued her from the rougher crowd at the Chidley Corners dance. He had been too concerned with getting there before something bad happened to the innocent girl he was fond of to think about his gas gauge. 

He had felt pity for her, for the sad sheltered little life she had lived before he knew her. There had been uncomfortable parts of his own childhood, but at least he had always known that his parents loved him. He’d been so proud of her too, for not shrinking from her overbearing uncle when he had come upon them on that road. 

She was the kind of girl that he found it impossible not to like.

*** ***

He had never been so surprised in his life as when Valancy Stirling had asked him to marry her. He’d run down to Roaring Abel’s to see if there was anything he could do for her, thinking perhaps she might want to travel to a larger city or do something, anything to get away from Deerwood and her family.

Her question had shocked him at first. He had an idea that she was more than fond of him, and that she had been about to say something else when she’d told him that she was crazy about him. Barney had not believed her at first, had wondered if perhaps he was daydreaming.

Then Valancy had handed him the letter from Dr. Trent.

His first thought was that it was quite unfair that so many other people should live long lives, while Valancy should have hers cut short. His second was that now he understood so much about Valancy and why she had made the choices she had. How could he refuse her this request? 

They had both set conditions on the marriage, but he thought that the most important one had been when they agreed to never lie to each other. He had been lied to before by people he trusted, and he found it to be soul-destroying. He knew it was a lie, of sorts, not to tell her who he really was, but Barney excused it by telling himself he never planned to live his old life again. To not tell her about being John Foster was more difficult to justify, but he decided that it was not really lying if she never asked him.

Valancy was willing to marry him as he stood, and he’d always thought her a bit of a dear. 

So he had married her, and brought her to his island on Mistawis. Her joy and delight at her first sight of the island had charmed her. He had guessed that Valancy had never been kissed before. So he made sure that her first kiss was worth remembering. It was no hardship to kiss her, no hardship to hold her in his arms.

*** ***

They lived through the seasons together, living life as it came to them. He enjoyed eating the wonderful meals that Valancy cooked, enjoyed berrying in the sunshine with her, enjoyed watching her live her life with none of the constraints that she had suffered under in the past. 

When he had gone to send away the finished manuscript for John Foster’s next work, he had asked her if she was afraid to stay alone. He had known that she wouldn’t be, but even so he had worried about her. He had been surprised by how good it felt to come back and see his own lights glowing in the darkness to guide him home. He was surprised at how much he enjoyed being married to her. The winter night he had been unable to get home, he had been most concerned by how Valancy would worry over him. 

It was good to be worried over.

It was good to be with Valancy, whatever they did. 

He loved to hear her laugh, to hear her express all the joy she took in the world around her. He loved to sit in silence with her, and do nothing at all by the hour. He loved to kiss her, loved knowing that he was the only man who would ever experience the feeling of her lips on his. He loved to take her in his arms at night and make love to her in the moonlight coming through the oriel window.

And he hated the thought that all too soon, it would be over. Too soon, it would be Valancy whose body needed to be prepared for burial, Valancy who would sleep forever under a blanket of wildflowers. He dreaded the thought that one day he would come in and find her lifeless body, that he would have to turn his Valancy back to the custody of the family who had never appreciated her. He had wondered if he would be able to get away with having her buried privately on his island, somewhere that she would always be surrounded by loveliness, rather than in the proper cemetery where she would be surrounded by Stirlings. But he knew that it was impossible, that he wouldn’t be able to stand against the forces of propriety.

It was dreadfully selfish of him, but he found himself hoping that when she passed, that it would be quietly in her sleep. He wanted her to go to sleep with all of her good memories surrounding her, and to find her asleep forever in the dawn. He wanted her not to suffer – surely there had been enough suffering in her life.

More than any of that, he wanted her not to die.

*** *** 

But it was not until the night at the railway switch, when she almost did die right before his eyes, that Barney knew the truth. He wasn’t just fond of Valancy. 

He loved her more than life itself. 

He had paced in his study for hours, afraid to go to their bedroom and find that she had suffered belated consequences of the shock, and that her heart had given out. It had been a relief to go in there and find her sleeping – or pretending to sleep, her breathing a comforting sound as he lay there in the dark, afraid to fall asleep and afraid to do anything that might strain her heart. 

When he had come home and found her letter in Bluebeard’s Chamber, he had been overjoyed to discover that Dr. Trent had made a mistake, to learn that Valancy would live a long healthy life. At the same time, he was confused by the idea that she thought she had tricked him. His Valancy could never trick anyone, could never lie to anyone. The revelation that his father had come, that she had found out he had not been completely honest with her, made some sense of it. 

And she had left the pearls. He knew she had not known they were real pearls, that she had thought they were merely beads, but she had worn them as proudly as any queen might wear her crown and jewels. He had loved seeing her in them – it had been worth every dollar to see her in them.

He had to go after her.

He couldn’t live without her.

**Author's Note:**

> I hope you like this! I just recently discovered the book, and agree with you that it's one of her best. I have a definite affection for Barney, and so I wanted to show him falling in love with her (because she is already in love with him) to fulfill your prompt. I enjoyed being able to do this as a last-minute pinch hit to make sure you have a wonderful Yuletide!


End file.
